Mentally ill and homeless, Kelly Thomas had dozens of run-ins with police in the years before he died after an altercation with six Fullerton officers, according to an internal document from the District Attorney's Office.

The document shows that Thomas was frequently stopped and questioned by officers throughout north Orange County, occasionally arrested for low-level crimes such as trespassing, and was once jailed for assault with a deadly weapon. It details 92 police reports that involved Thomas between 1990 and his death last summer.

Attorneys defending three Fullerton officers charged in connection with his death have portrayed Thomas as a trouble-maker who refused police orders. Prosecutors have described Thomas as an unassuming victim – "a sad homeless person that is no danger physically to anyone," in the words of one prosecution expert.

The criminal history compiled by the District Attorney's Office shows that the majority of Thomas' encounters with police resulted in nothing more than a warning or citation. But it also includes 27 arrests, most often for old warrants, trespassing or violating court orders to stay away from a grocery store that Thomas frequented.

Thomas was arrested in 2008 after an Anaheim child-care center reported that he was urinating in front of children; court records show he pleaded guilty to urinating in public. He was arrested in 2010 after an Anaheim fruit-stand vendor said he threw rocks at her, and later pleaded guilty to trespassing.

He was twice arrested on suspicion of assault, the document shows – once for punching a man who asked him to leave a Christmas party, where a 14-year-old girl said he had approached her with the words "hey sexy." But court records show that he was never prosecuted on that assault charge or on the other allegation, in which a restaurant worker said Thomas threw a watch at him.

Most crimes were minor

Court records show that Thomas has faced a series of misdemeanors and low-level infractions, but only one felony case. That was in 1995, when police said he attacked his grandfather with a fireplace poker, records show.

The grandfather said Thomas bludgeoned him with the poker in an unprovoked attack. Thomas told police the two were fighting after his grandfather looked at him the wrong way, and that he grabbed the poker from his grandfather, according to the District Attorney's document. Thomas later pleaded guilty to assault with a deadly weapon and was sentenced to 270 days in jail.

A psychological examination included in the court file quotes Thomas as saying he began using drugs in the fifth grade and had used LSD, pot, methamphetamine and alcohol. The doctor who conducted the exam concluded that Thomas had suffered "organic impairment of cognitive functioning" because of his drug abuse, according to the document.

Thomas lived on the streets for years and was known to officers in several cities; in 2003, an unidentified Fullerton officer described him in a report as a new transient in the downtown area. The District Attorney's review found that 13 of Thomas' contacts with police there and in other cities ended with him getting a warning to move along or to stay away from businesses. Police wrote Thomas citations – for jaywalking, littering and other infractions – 15 times.

His record of police contacts also included three reports that he had gone missing from psychological facilities, and a report of a jail assault in which he was the victim. His father once reported him to police, saying he stole a $550 guitar, according to the documents. His mother went to police in 2010 with a restraining order against him – a move his family has said was intended to help get him into mental-health treatment.

But a third of the 92 police contacts included in the District Attorney's review were listed as "field interviews" or street checks only, or resulted in no apparent action.

In three of those cases, police stopped and questioned Thomas after seeing him look into vehicle windows or otherwise appear to "case" vehicles, but let him go. A similar report drew Fullerton police to their fatal encounter with him on the night of July 5, 2011, when a caller said Thomas "was roaming" a downtown parking lot, looking in cars and "pulling on door handles."

The City of Fullerton has since said that no other evidence exists that "Thomas actually tried to steal anything from vehicles."

The District Attorney's Office has charged former Fullerton officer Manuel Ramos with second-degree murder, saying he escalated that call into the beating that killed Thomas. It also has charged former Cpl. Jay Cicinelli, saying he helped beat Thomas and used his stun gun to both shock and pummel him. Last month, a grand jury indicted a third former officer, Joseph Wolfe, in the beating.

All three ex-officers have pleaded not guilty.

Crime-history compilation common courtroom practice

The District Attorney's Office confirmed that it compiled the report on Thomas' police history. Chief of Staff Susan Kang Schroeder called it a common practice, especially when prosecutors expect the defense to use a victim's criminal history to attack their case.

"It's in the typical defense playbook to try to dirty up the victim. It's defense strategy 101," Schroeder said. In this case, she added, "Kelly Thomas' background is mostly being homeless."

But the attorney representing Cicinelli said Thomas' frequent contacts with police "paint a very different picture (than) the one that has been portrayed in the media."

"I think the picture painted before was that the police officers were looking to roust a homeless person," attorney Michael Schwartz said. "I think what is telling is that his own mother had a restraining order against him ... This is not somebody who is docile."

Schwartz had not seen the District Attorney's report; prosecutors have until 30 days before trial to turn over such evidence to the defense. He said it's hard to predict how Thomas' contacts with police will factor into the criminal case.

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